Tag: Foul Tip

Heartbreaking Bravery recently went offline but all facets of the site are back to being fully operational. Apologies for any inconveniences. All posts that were slated to run during that brief hiatus will appear with this note.

In the piece he wrote for A Year’s Worth of Memories last year, Meat Wave’s Ryan Wizniak chose to celebrate fellow Chicago greats Melkbelly. For the 2016 edition, Wizniak continues to celebrates his peers, this time bringing records from Oozing Wound, Luggage, Foul Tip, and Lifestyles into the fold. It’s always heartening to see a musician lift up the musicians that surround them and this piece is no exception. Explore the records listed below and keep an eye on this site throughout 2017 for more updates on Wizniak’s various projects. Enjoy.

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Another year, another never-ending buffet of great music to consume. Below are a few albums that you may or may not have missed while filling up on extra servings of Angel Olsen or Iggy Pop.

Hearing the Ooze evolve from their excellent first tape to their flawless third full length has been a serious treat. The chemistry between Zack, Kevin and Kyle is in full force on this one as they plow through track after track of their own brand of genuinely uncategorizable, punishing noise. If this is metal, it’s certainly pushing the genre in a much more exciting and expansive direction by refusing to stick to the tropes that have been kicking around for the last thirty years, so keep your lazy Slayer comparisons to yourself. Whatever Forever is a solid addition to an already fantastic catalogue and stands out as one of the years most unique and exciting releases.

One of my favorite memories of 2016 was taking a trip to Madison with Joe to catch Luggage open up for Michigan legends, Protomartyr. It was my first time attending one of their shows and I was blown away by their sheer volume and force. While Sun may have its share of shoegazery post-punk rippers it also boasts long, beautiful entrancing passages courtesy of Michael Vallera’s guitar work and propelled by the pummeling and repetitive rhythm section of Luca Cimmarusti and Michael John Grant. Keep an eye out for these boys, they are already hard at work on new material.

On this release Adam Luksetich and Ed Bornstein stretch the idea of what a post-punk drum and bass duo can do. There truly isn’t a weak spot on this record. Even the lyrics are top notch. 10/10. Bonus: It also boasts one of the most interesting Black Sabbath covers around.

Lifestyles is a grungy, no bullshit, noise rock group featuring members of Lil Tits, Foul Tip, and Touched by a Ghoul. While it’s easy to put Lifestyles under the grunge umbrella (they have mastered the genres tension and release moments to perfection), they do away the slacker sloppiness of their forebears and opt to take a more driving and cerebral route instead. It’s a fun ride filled with enough earworms to keep your mind off of the terrible political climate that has swept the country.

While January and February certainly had their fair share of great music videos, March saw an influx of truly great clips find their way out into the world. From Johanna Warren‘s extraordinary “Great Lake” (which I was fortunate enough to premiere over at Consequence of Sound) to a new, patently excellent, video from PUP, the format’s found its stride. Apart from the music videos, there was an outstanding Vaadat Charigimmini-documentary chronicling their first US tour.

Since there were so many clips — and since so many were so exceptional — they’ll be split into two categories below. At the very bottom of the page will be the honorable mentions category and above that will be a slew of videos that have positioned themselves to be early year-end contenders. Since “Great Lake” was already mentioned above, it won’t be below. Similarly, since Yours Are the Only Ears’ aching, gorgeous video for “Low” is the only non-YouTube entry, it will simply be listed in this paragraph (but rest assured, it’s more than worth your time). For the sake of convenience, 31 music videos are featured- one for each day in March.

Watch some of the finest clips of a young 2016 via the embed (with an accompanying tracklist tucked underneath) and explore the laundry list of exceptional titles in the honorable mentions category below the player. Enjoy.

Once more, a lot of material has surfaced since this site’s last regular update. A few premieres are in the (very) near future, though, as are a series of recaps. A few of those — like this very piece — will be limited to March, while the others will cover the first, very rich, quarter of 2016. Since so much has amassed in that period of time, a lot of these will simply be presented as lists with hyperlinks. As much as I wish I could grant all of these individual pieces the attention they genuinely deserve, the most I can do at this point is make sure they don’t go completely unnoticed. Now that all of that’s covered, please enjoy this list of March’s finest full streams (the best approach to consumption would be to bookmark the page and explore it at will). Keep an eye on this site for a lot more in a very short span of days as it claws its way back into regular coverage.

Even by the ridiculous standards of the past few weeks, today was absolutely loaded with worthwhile content. Antarctigo Vespucci streamed their second outstandning EP of the year- I’m So Tethered- over at The AV Club and Field Division unveiled their mesmerizing Reverie StateEP, rounding out today’s full streams. The full songs department was a bit more plentiful, with new offerings ranging from the most recent look at Big Ups‘ side of their split with Washer (via the ravaged and ravaging “Not Today“) to the gentle acoustic pull of Soft Fangs’ “Dog Park“. Continuing things in the quieter realms were the lightly damaged pscyh-folk of Ready Astronaut’s “Lost In Space” and the quietly lilting sounds of Elephant Micah’s “By the Canal“. Fleshing out the DIY punk side of things was another sideways glance at Nots’ hotly-tipped We Are Nots, courtesy of “Reactor“, and an exhilarating career-best from Crying called “War of Attrition“. Really, though, today absolutely belonged to music videos. Nearly every single one of these would seem like an obvious feature choice on literally any other day but as it stands, today will be going to the most thematically appropriate.

Before jumping into Nobunny‘s most recent hellscape, it’s worth touching on everything else that made up today’s embarrassment of riches in the visual medium field. Cool Runnings skated their way through a desert oblivion in “Blister“, Foul Tip indulged a lo-fi lunacy in “Madness“, and Platinum Boys exuded a rock n’ roll ethos in “Candy“. Sweet Apple teamed up with Guided By Voices’ Robert Pollard to soundtrack a memorable Halloween outing in “Reunion“, former Speedy Ortiz guitarist Matt Robidux’s new project- Curse Purse- embraced the heavily discordant in “Message CP“, and Willis Earl Beal drifted off into darkly ambient territories with “I AM.” The Growlers used a bevvy of classically filmic composition tricks in the black-and-white clip for “Good Advice“, Team Spirit dealt with an insane producer in their absurdly entertaining clip for “Satisfaction“, and MONO released an absolute gift of a video in the gorgeous, jaw-dropping, Mitsuyo Miyazaki-directed clip for “Where We Begin“, which may very well be one of that medium’s most compelling pieces this year. Even with the strength of that MONO video, it just felt too appropriate to give today’s spot to the deranged gore of Nobunny’s short film, Nightmare Night– just in time for the holiday.

First thing’s first: this is a severely NSFW clip (although that should just automatically be assumed with anything related to Nobunny), so be sure to avoid that mistake. Blood, gore, B-movie tropes, and a DIY resonance abound in Nightmare Night, a spirited homage to the maniacal tendencies that come attached to the Halloween season. From its introductory sequence that introduces a burnt out cast of misfits to the unbridled bloodshed, Nobunny’s aims are even less restrained than usual. If there’s a mandatory genre beat to be hit, it’s not just touched on- it’s downright obliterated. Taking the bloodlust to sadistic levels that’d make even Tarantino blush, everyone’s favorite masked rodent stars as the centerpiece of this nightmarish fever dream. Picking off the would-be partiers one by one until the final climactic battle, Nobunny runs through a cast of fellow musicians while “Lizard Liars” from last year’s excellent Secret Songs: Reflections From The Ear Mirror propels everything towards its conclusion. Blackly comedic, entirely unrestrained, and ridiculously bombastic, Nightmare Night is the perfect way to kick off a weekend of veiled debauchery.